love is
by ribbons-blue
Summary: Of every existing person, he had to be enamored with the one human being who would say 'no' to immortality. Elijah was clearly a glutton for punishment. [Elijah x Elena]


**BEFORE YOU READ: Takes place at the end of Season 3, after Elena wakes up from drowning and discovers she is transitioning into a vampire. What if she made a much different choice?**

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_**Storge**_

**familial love; a natural affection bespeaking of friendship**

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—

—

She had grown up in this room. She had slept in this very spot for eighteen years.

The baby's crib in the corner had eventually been replaced with a child's cot, decorated with the requisite flowers and ponies that most every young girl fancied at some point in their childhood, and then been discarded for a larger bed once maturity had set in at the wise age of thirteen and she had deemed it high time to grow up.

She had grown up in this room. She had slept in this very spot for eighteen years.

And now, Elena Gilbert would grow up no more. Whether by the thievery of death or the ignorance of time, she had lost that precious chance.

She would forever bear the face of a young human girl who had greedily longed for too much, and while many would have called that a blessing, Elena could only mourn what would never come to be. Images spun with cruel taunting throughout her mind—a small child, bearing her deep brown gaze and another's mischievous smile, perhaps; a mirror she peered into curiously, marveling at the laughter lines crinkling at her eyes and the gray that peppered once-flawless russet curls; the contentedness of a life that seemed far too short to those granted immortality, and yet just enough to those who had learned the beauty of the ephemeral.

Hours had passed thus far, the clock's ticking a slow dirge that accompanied the gradual whittling away of her remaining life.

Elena had been lying there, in that familiar bed of hers, for the better part of the day, curled up in Jeremy's protective grasp. Shock, numbness, and an overall listlessness were not feigned at this point, and she remained voluntarily deaf and unresponsive to the worried murmurs and strained veins of conversation cluttering the air above her bowed head.

_She needs to feed,_ Damon had said, an audible tremor in his voice. He struggled to mask it with brusqueness. _There's not much time left. A few hours…and she'll…_

Even without looking, Elena knew his eyes would be wide with a rippling undercurrent of fury, that his hair would be mussed from repeated, anxious running of his hands through it. Damon had never dealt well with pressure, and for all his years as a vampire had sadly never come to accept the fact that all people, especially those he cared about, would eventually come to die.

_We can't force her to,_ came Stefan's familiar baritone and tortured tone.

Dear Stefan probably had his careworn brow furrowed in deep consternation, his mouth turned down in that permanent grimace of his. She can picture it in her head with a startling clarity, like a beloved memory or cherished picture. It was a picture she was loathe to lock away in the portion of her heart belonging to the past, but she needed to do it now.

She was out of time for growing up, after all.

_This is all my fault_, Matt lamented. _It should have been me, it should have been me._

And Matt...sweet Matt, who wrings his hands and clenches his fists whenever he's frightened, unable to articulate exactly what he feels. Whether five years old and facing the playground bully, or eighteen and witnessing his best friend die, it was comforting to know that Matt was the same gentle constant in her life he had always been.

_We can't let Elena die! Even...even if she's a vampire, it's better than the alternative_! Caroline cried.

She'll be chewing nervously on a finger, distress in her blue gaze and mouth slightly agape. It never fails in giving her a rather vacant look; one Elena and Bonnie have mercilessly teased her about in the past. Caroline had never been one to do things by halves, for her heart was too big and her feelings too irrepressible, and Elena dearly hoped that one of her best friends was not about to drag her out into the streets by the roots of her hair and force her onto some unsuspecting passerby.

_A spell_, Bonnie suggested, though without any true hope in the words. _Maybe there's a spell, some way to stop her turning..._

Bonnie would be calm, rational, Elena decided. Her exterior would be rigidly composed while her inside would be the very epitome of turmoil and a crushing distress. Bonnie has always taken too much upon herself, directed everything inwards...Elena doesn't want Bonnie to berate herself over this though. Doesn't want her to suffer any more because of Elena's silly, silly choices.

She knew these people, Elena reminded her dwindling human self—the one warring viciously against the slow encroach of a dark-eyed, vein-ridden copy come to still her beating heart. She cradled the conjured images of them close in her mind, fingers reflexively clenching tight as though to prevent the inevitable time when they slipped away. She loved these people, unconditionally, for all their fault and failings and virtues_. _

But if she knew them so well, Elena wordlessly agonized to herself, safely ensconced in her brother's oxygen-depriving grasp (but breathing was redundant now, wasn't it?), then shouldn't the reverse have been equally as true? Shouldn't they know her, from the little nuances that compose her personality to the larger expectations she has from life? Her desires, her wishes, her little girlish dreams?

If it were so, then why, _why,_ were they all gathered about her, discussing her impending death and desperately attempting to circumvent it by pushing her onto the one path she had repeatedly told Stefan and Damon she would never traverse?

The question washed tiredly against her already worn mind, an unremitting wave brandishing its full might as it would upon a stone it was determined to see crumbled.

Elena had the despairing fear that it had already succeeded in doing so.

The overwhelming barrage of voices continued with a relentlessly increasing intensity, causing Elena to flinch and burrow deeper into her brother's arms. Her hearing was in an odd state at the moment, hovering somewhere between unbearably sharp and irritatingly fuzzy, like an old radio that screeched out wavering tunes in varying pitches.

A sudden shout, born of anger and desperation, emanated from one of the people debating over which course her life was to follow. Pain ricocheted through her like the sharp metal of a dagger tearing heedlessly through flesh, starting somewhere in her aching head and dragging agonizingly down to her curled feet. Try as she did to muffle the sound of her whimpered vocalization of this unparalleled sensation, Jeremy's suddenly-tightened grip upon her indicated that she had utterly failed in this.

Regret swept through her with a fierce renewal; she paid no heed to the sudden lull in conversation, the anxious pause of the flurry of discussion. All that mattered was that her brave, brave little brother was frightened, and it was her fault.

Elena clutched Jeremy's hand with an apologetic squeeze and brought it to her trembling lips for a reassuring kiss.

In the face of her own crippling terror, it was the most she could muster.

—

—

He was a little ways out of Virginia when the call came.

Consumed by a conflicting mixture of sorrow over the death of yet another brother, the crushing guilt of being far too late once again (_Henrik, Finn, Niklaus…would Kol be the next to suffer from his failings as a protector? Would Rebekah?)_, and the dominant desire to escape the hellish little town he had once foolishly thought to call home, Elijah had fled Mystic Falls with the certainty that there was no longer anything left for him (_not even gentle brown eyes, set in a beautiful face, made all the more so by the bravery that shone from it). _

Unfortunately, like always, Elijah's plans had been thoroughly shot to hell with a phone call from a sibling.

The small, flashing name of _Rebekah_ lit up the screen of his phone.

(_'You're such a technophobe, dear brother,' she had scolded playfully when he had expressed his dislike of mobile phones to his forever-teenage sister. Her expression morphing into one of wistful fondness, she had cradled her phone with a distant look in blue eyes. 'Please get one. That way…we can always keep in contact. Even when we're far away from one another, we can always be together.'_

_Elijah had purchased one the very next day.)_

Sighing, he flipped it open in a movement that would have been a mere blur to the human eye, his sight never deviating from the road stretching monotonously before him—a path he had traveled far too often; a path he knew held naught but empty years strung together by equally empty seconds, minutes, and hours.

"Rebekah," he greeted tonelessly, mind too fatigued and soul too burdened to affect any sort of affectionate shade to the word.

"Elijah." It was barely more than a whisper, a breathy word that promised to shatter into a thousand terrified shards.

For a fleeting moment he could not reconcile the quavering, tiny little voice with that of the headstrong woman who projected confidence and boldness about her like a shield. This was not the Rebekah of the present; this was his all-too-human little sister from days long since passed, running to her big brother when she had been hurt or frightened and sought the protective sanctuary of his embrace. It was a Rebekah he had not encountered for quite a number of centuries.

He immediately gripped his phone far more tightly than necessary at the vulnerability in his sister's tenor, causing the state-of-the-art metallic casing to audibly _crack_ at the vampiric strength it was so evidently not equipped to handle.

"What is it?" All apathy had vanished, replaced with an immediate sense of alarm.

"I've done something." There was an odd, clashing mixture of contrition and tentative elation in the words; Elijah's gut twisting unpleasantly in response. When Rebekah spoke again, it was hazy and cluttered with nonsensical snippets. "But we're safe now. You're safe. I couldn't…I couldn't allow you to be killed by that man. By mother. So I had to, you see."

"Where are you, Rebekah?" He struggled to keep the question even and measured, unnerved by his sister's uncharacteristic ramblings.

She didn't reply. Frustrated, Elijah slammed one hand down upon the steering wheel, irrevocably bending it. "Rebekah," he murmured lowly into the phone, reigning in his escaping temper. "I need you to tell me where you are. If you're in trouble, I'll find you."

There was another moment of prolonged silence, only the soft, rhythmic breaths playing in his ear alerting him to her presence.

"I'm still in Mystic Falls, Elijah," his sister told him flatly. "And I've just killed Elena Gilbert."

A click. A monotonous hum.

Rebekah had hung up.

—

—

Even though Elena's senses were dizzily alternating between keenness and dullness, it was easy enough to tell when someone new and apparently unwanted had entered the room.

This was mainly due to the fact that _some_ people just couldn't be considerate of those who were trying to die in peace and were intent on vocally making known their displeasure at what had occurred.

"You!" The furious yelp came from what sounded to be Damon, as impetuous and impertinent as ever. "You goddamned asshole, this is all your fault!"

Like the ever-cliché bursting dam, the determined (if false) composure she had strived to maintain for so many long hours was instantly and effortlessly overridden at Damon's howled accusation.

Elena jerked at the last few words, panic filling her to the point of suffocation. Damon's ire could have only been incited by a few choice people at this moment—Klaus, for being ultimately responsible for the demise of his best friend; or Rebekah, for being the reason that the woman he loved had become like _him. _

And Klaus was dead.

For a chillingly long instant, she was fearful that Rebekah had come back to expedite her dying. The coldly beautiful face, set in a killing rage and illuminated eerily by the headlights of an old pickup truck, danced even behind her tightly-shut eyelids.

The mere thought of the blonde vampire caused her entire body to seize in a defensive flinch, her mind casting her back to dark river water that had twice engulfed her in a blackness that swallowed her screams and smothered the pleading faces of her parents. Of Matt.

The terror that had begun to strain her breathing, stopping up her lungs, began to feel frighteningly close to the unforgiving rush of water upon her nose and mouth.

_Please no. Please._

She pressed her hands against her ears, trying with futility to block out the memories that the return of her murderer had given rise to.

The voice that answered Damon, however, wasn't quite the arrogantly drawling, deceivingly lilting one she expected.

"Please do not attribute crimes to me that I did not commit, Damon."

Her already struggling heart gave a small, interrupting stutter at the deep, familiar tone—one she had long since come to associate with archaic power and a commanding presence, opaque black eyes and the handsomely grim countenance of one who had weathered the countless ages.

_Elijah_.

The name passed, almost unbidden, through her turbulent mind, settling her chaotic thoughts into a strange semblance of calm…the first respite she had had granted to her all day.

It wasn't Rebekah.

_Elijah_. The name, along with an electrifying jolt of relief, swept through her yet again, as though repeating it could ward away all ills, could magic away all of the problems that had been thrust upon her since awakening, soaked and shivering, on a cold hospital gurney.

Of course, Damon was again the one to immediately shatter any tentative grasp on peace she had managed to obtain.

There was a wild shout from the elder Salvatore and a myriad of foul swears, accompanied by the familiar rush of wind that usually meant a vampire had passed by unseen in their typically quick manner.

Elena could only suppose that, Damon being Damon, had reacted as he was most wont to do: impulsively flying at Elijah to attack him.

But from the loud sound of splintering wood and a pained yell that immediately followed, Elena also felt she wasn't too haphazard in guessing that Elijah wasn't at his most patient tonight. Given that it had been the rough breaking of oak and not the sharp crack of glass, Damon could most probably be found at the foot of her stairs right about then.

"Stefan, I suggest you go down and check that I have not caused irreparable damage to your brother." Elijah's cold voice cut sharply through the air.

"I'm not leaving you here with her."

There was a pause. Then came a dangerously soft, "Do you think I came to hurt her?"

Something told Elena that it would have been wiser not to reward that double-edged query with a reply, yet it was an unfortunate Salvatore family trait that rashness often ruled over common sense.

Elena heard Stefan snort, and it was possibly the most mirthless sound she had ever bore witness to. "Oh no, because your family has absolutely _never_ done anything to cause harm to her in the past. Why on _earth_ would I feel any apprehension about leaving you alone with the girl your siblings have repeatedly managed to screw over?"

Elena made a mental note to speak to Stefan about toning down his bad attempts at sarcasm in the remaining few hours of her life.

"I believe we have already established that I am not my family."

"Stefan," she managed, her voice slightly hoarse from disuse and sporadic bouts of uncontrollable sobbing throughout the day. The room immediately quieted, whatever retort Stefan had prepared dying abruptly on his lips. "It's fine," she rasped, the syllables grating uncomfortably against her raw throat. "I'll talk to him."

Immediately, a chorus of protesting voices arose to challenge her decision. Given that Elena still had yet to remove herself from Jeremy's grasp, she was denied the small amusement of watching the incredulity and worry for her sanity playing out on her friends' faces.

"Elena, are you crazy! He isn't _safe!_"

"Yeah, come on. How do we know _this guy_ isn't here to finish what his sister started?"

"I agree with Caroline and Matt. He could—"

"Kill me?" Elena cut in easily over Bonnie's cautioning tone, the words flowing a bit more freely then. "I only have a few more hours, guys," she reminded them softly. A small, humorless smile appeared, concealed from the concerned gazes roving over her bowed head of curls. "There isn't much he or anyone else can do to me anymore."

—

—

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_**Philia**_

**virtuous and affectionate love; a deep trust that allows the sharing of fears and secrets alike**

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—-

—-

He hadn't been prepared for the sight that greeted him upon his hasty entrance into the Gilbert house.

The expected ferocity of the Salvatores had been noted with only a hint of annoyance and was a problem solved easily enough, and the others present departed after one meaningfully icy look from him. Vampire, witch, human—all were merely inconsequential shadows that flickered in the periphery, unworthy of more than a passing consideration. Elijah had eyes only for the one curled upon the center of the bed.

She bore the startling appearance of a much younger girl, oddly lost and small in her brother's arms. The once vibrant flush of life in her olive skin had vanished, leaving behind only a remnant of her former self. The deep brown of her eyes was concealed by fluttering lashes as she struggled not to close them—perhaps frightened that doing so would mean never again awakening.

But her face resembled nothing more than the most perfect display of serene repose, the like of which Elijah had witnessed on valiant queens and determined warriors in the dusty ages of the past. She was displaying bravery as Elijah had rarely seen; bravery in the face of a crumbling world she had loved and hated, wept in and laughed at, danced for and dreamed of.

And it was all too clear that her courage was not meant for either Salvatore, nor for the assorted group friends that had hesitantly left.

He followed the trail of her gaze as it came to rest lovingly upon the face of the boy clinging desperately to her, his eyes hollow from sorrow and his mouth the trembling line of a child trying not to sob.

The faint rustle of curls and the soft exhalation of a weary breath reached Elijah's ears as Elena lifted her head slightly, so as to look fully into her brother's pained face.

"Jeremy, you have to go now, okay?" Elena's cajoling voice broke the heavy quiet in the room. "Just for a little while—maybe make sure the others aren't preparing a full battle plan for charging back up here to rescue me." Her hand, quivering with the strain of holding it steady, pushed lightly on the boy's arm.

Elijah watched silently as she gently broke free from her brother's constraining grip, the slightly pinched look to her face betraying the effort it took her waning body to do so.

"No," the boy protested vehemently, sending a look of utmost loathing at the Original. Elijah couldn't really fault him for it; particularly since a great deal of the tragedy thus far inflicted on the Gilbert family had regrettably been by his hand. "I'm not leaving you alone_, _Elena! If you think that—"

"I'll be fine," she interrupted, summoning a reassuring smile to her lips that fooled no one. "Really, Jeremy. Elijah's not going to do anything to me." Her brown eyes left her brother's desperate face and flicked quickly to meet Elijah's solemn gaze, as though seeking to confirm her statement.

The boy's sharp, distrusting stare accompanied Elena's softer one, before shifting his attention back onto his sister. "It's not only that," he muttered. "What if…what if while I'm gone, you…" A quavering breath interrupted the anguished words. "Is that why you don't want me here? You don't want me to see, to be here…?"

Jeremy trailed off, unable to go on. The unspoken _You don't want me to be here when you die? _lingered between the two siblings, the identical heartbreak on each face difficult to witness.

Elijah's hands clenched behind his back, and not for the first time that night he fervently damned the selfishness of his sister, that insatiable desire to obtain revenge on those who had in any way wronged her. Could she not remember the agonizing pain that went hand in hand with the loss of a beloved sibling? The misery of Finn vanishing one day, of pleading with Klaus to reveal where their brother had disappeared to? The fury of discovering headstrong, mischievous Kol to be similarly missing, taking with him his lighthearted tricks and laughter?

Didn't she recall the crippling torrent of emotions, sadness and loss and an encompassing devastation, that had taken hold of them all when Niklaus had stumbled back home one fateful morning, a mangled, motionless Henrik cradled in his arms?

Because Elijah did.

Perhaps it was the curse of a vampire's memory, to live forever and yet forget nothing, or the fact that such a sharp sadness was irreversibly imprinted upon the soul, but Elijah remembered the pain with perfect acuity.

And it was not a sensation he would have wished upon his worst enemy, let alone the one person he'd recently found himself to…

He sighed, shaking himself from memories and feelings that were best left unexplored.

A scolding voice permeated his pensiveness. "Don't be stupid," Elena was saying, playfully cuffing the young boy on his head. "Of course I'm not going anywhere without you. And everything's going to be fine, Jer. I promise, okay?"

The half-hearted tone was one Elijah recognized all too well—it was one he had employed often, usually when comforting a frightened brother or sister with words he knew to be a lie. How many times had he used it himself, his hands caressing tumbled hair of gold and blonde and brown as young faces peeked up at him, desperate for reassurance?

His eyes fell on the determinedly smiling face of Elena, and the boy reluctantly climbing off the bed (_because he had his sister's word that nothing would happen, that everything would turn out like a fairytale ending, and everyone knew that big sisters didn't lie_).

"_Please_," the young boy murmured to him as he stumbled numbly though the doorway, a feverish vigor to the plea. "Take care of her."

Whether Jeremy was entreating Elijah not to injure his sister further, or whether the words possessed a darker connotation of _don't allow my sister to die, don't let her die_….Elijah somberly wondered whether he could fulfill either one.

—

—

There was no time to waste words. Though time was all Elijah had left, it was the very villain that was currently whittling away at the thin thread that tethered Elena to life.

"You've decided." It was a simple declaration that cleaved down, down, down—through the air and through Elena's falsely cheerful expression.

She offered a wane smile. "You're very perceptive."

He didn't return it. "I've had practice." _Or perhaps I merely know you. _

"Jeremy…" Elena swallowed the hard lump in her throat as she forced her brother's name out.

"I will take care of him."

The quiet assertion caused Elena to jerk surprised eyes up to meet Elijah's reassuringly steady ones. She searched his face rapidly, the shock from his offer dissolving in favor of trying to detect any disingenuousness in his features.

There was none.

Elena made to reply, but the words stuck fast in her closing throat.

"He won't want for anything, ever. I'll keep him safe for the remainder of his natural life." Elijah traversed the length of her childhood bedroom with two strides, one hand reaching out to capture Elena's subtly trembling one as he murmured, "He'll experience the life we couldn't have, Elena."

"W-why…?" The query was an airy breath, as though she was fearful that any spoken word might negate the offer.

"I realize that this is entirely my sister's fault. If she was the one to rob your brother of you, then the least I can do is watch over him in your place." A complete and utter lie, seeing as he probably would have done anything this girl requested of him in this moment, but if Elena believed it was merely his ancient honor and guilt that spurred him to promise such a thing…it was all for the better.

A rogue tear managed to trail its way down already stained cheeks. "He'll be happy?"

_Even without me? _She wanted so desperately to ask, but bit down on the selfish comment before it could emerge.

As though sensing her unspoken thought, he nodded shortly, dark hair becoming ruffled with the motion. "As much as he can be."

"He'll live to be old and wrinkly, with someone he loves?" Elena sniffed, rubbing her already reddened nose—a quick peek at Elijah revealed nothing more than that preternatural sense of understanding he always seemed to exude, his eyes regarding her with an unwavering intensity that said he neither scorned nor belittled her tears.

Her fingers were briefly constricted as Elijah's tightened over hers, the sensation passing just as quickly as it had come. "He will." A strange smile, more of funny quirk of the lips, touched upon his mouth. "You have my word, Elena."

A tired laugh escaped her as she looked up at him. "Those words never bode well for us, do they? How about a simple, 'I promise' instead?"

His eyes glinted with the same cynical amusement underlying her own gaze.

—

—

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_**Agape**_

**to love another wholly, without expecting it in kind; self-sacrificial love**

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"Elijah…what about you?" She rubbed a hand against her forehead, smoothing out the lines of worry that had formed there. A bleak smile, one contrasting greatly with the usual earnestness hers radiated, was offered. "Everyone else hurried to throw in their two cents."

Given from what he had observed of her interactions with her friends in the past, he couldn't say he was surprised in the least.

"Well?" Her voice jarred him from his unpleasant dwellings, hesitance replacing the earlier ruefulness. "Do you…do you have something you'd like to say?"

The words were acrid on his tongue even as he spoke. "I cannot tell you what to do, Elena. Despite what your friends have impressed upon you…this is _your_ choice."

"I'm not asking for an answer, Elijah," she replied in that damnably knowing way of hers, her brown eyes radiating the calm certainty of a woman many times her age. It had always been the most unnerving quality about her—the little human girl with the gaze that scoured too keenly and too deeply for the reserved Elijah's liking. "I know what I want to do. What I'm _going _to do. I just…I guess I just want to know if you ever cared enough to have an opinion on the matter."

Slim fingertips rose and pressed gently against his cheek in a fleeting gesture, grazing his skin as though it was her express right to touch him in such a familiar way.

Elijah realized, with a bitter and abrupt clarity, that it hadn't ever belonged to anyone else.

And cared _enough_ to form an opinion? It was difficult not to outright scoff at the absurdity of that statement, not to capture her worryingly pallid face in his hands and desperately try to glean even the barest hint of what had caused her to say such a thing.

For the surmounting problem had always been that he had cared far, far too _much_ for this girl, ever since she had irritatingly managed to reclaim the affection that Tatia had carelessly discarded and rekindle the trust that Katerina had cruelly mangled. Ever since she had appeared before him with her ancestors' chocolate gaze and captivating smile, and yet infused both with such a sincerity and a determined fierceness that he could see none other than Elena Gilbert before him.

It wasn't a lack of caring that stayed his tongue and allowed cold indifference to play upon his features like a carefully-cultivated mask. It was the fact that even one second's reprieve of his vigilant governance over his emotions would result in him discarding every claim to dignity and icy poise he had ever paraded, and he would more than likely fall to his knees and beg her to decide to traverse the same damning road her Petrova predecessors had chosen.

But Elijah, whether the cost be his own heart or continued sanity, would not persuade Elena to deviate from her decided course. To embrace vampirism and the shadowy life it offered.

Oh, undoubtedly he would be able to. His family had often teased him for being the silver-tongued one of the family, the dark charmer who was capable of changing an opponent's mind with a few wily words and soothing vicious quarrels with his convincing rationale.

But this time, he could not.

Or more appropriately, he _would_ not.

And that was because he understood that Elena Gilbert did not refuse becoming a vampire out of any sense of moral superiority or hypocritical disgust.

It was because Elena Gilbert valued her humanity—her weak, impulsive, and ever-persevering trait of humanity—and would not allow a fear of death to deter her from seeing that path through to the very end.

He had once wished to tell her how she reminded him of the beauty of humanity.

But now…now that he was faced with the very prospect of her dying in his arms, _because_ of that short-lived, fallible mortality of hers, he couldn't think of why he ever thought it to be beautiful in the first place.

"Does it really matter?" He said, an old tiredness weighting the question down. "Are my words so important? Would it really change anything, Elena?"

There was a thoughtful lull.

"No," she mused softly to herself then, dark lashes sweeping against nearly imperceptible smudges beneath closed eyes. "I don't think it would change anything."

_Of course_. The thought rose to the forefront of his mind, an amalgam of mordancy and resignation with it. Love was hardly anything novel to Elijah—but being on the receiving end of it was. He had forever come second in the hearts of those he had cherished best, losing Tatia to Klaus and Katerina to her own self-love, that he irritably berated himself for expecting anything else.

"But merely because it wouldn't change anything, what you feel still matters to me, Elijah. It…always has, you know."

A rueful grimace. "I know."

—

—

* * *

_**Eros**_

**the timeless love that has enthralled poets and inspired painters**

**a consuming love that rarely last**

* * *

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Light from the setting sun was already beginning to seep through her drawn curtains—nature's empty hourglass indicating that Elena's time of deliberation had finally reached its end.

Vampire and human, however, kept their eyes resolutely away from the window—perhaps employing the childish logic of if something wasn't seen, then it didn't exist. That averting one's gaze or pressing hands over eyes could make all the bad things irretrievably disappear.

But Elijah, always the one to say what no one else could, was the one to shatter the sheltered fantasy of ignorance.

"It's time, Elena." Elijah nearly laughed bitterly at the words, glancing to the disappearing sunlight that relegated them to redundancy.

"I guess." She was equally as reluctant, her hands tightening around his. Neither knew at which point in the night their fingers had entwined; neither particularly cared.

"You wish your brother to be present," he said, gently loosening her reflexive grip about him. Elijah stood, his suit rumpled almost comically and looking so displaced on the normally immaculate vampire that Elena was bizarrely disturbed.

Pain flickered briefly across her face, but ephemeral for the quickness with which she suppressed it. "Yes, please. And…and _only_ Jeremy."

He tilted his head inquiringly. "You do not wish for the company of your friends?"

"No," she murmured, glancing aside. "I've already said my goodbyes. I had closure. I want….I only want the ones I love most to be there when…." Her throat closed up, and she retreated into muteness.

Elijah had taken only a few curt steps towards the door when her tremulous voice, catching with the effort of maintaining breath for words, stopped him.

"You'll be there too?" she whispered, eyes downcast as she made her request. "When it happens?"

Despite the immeasurable pain it would cause him, it was hardly within his power to deny her anything. Not now.

"I will," he affirmed.

Another heavy step taken towards the door, carrying him one step closer to playing his part in the demise of the one human that had ever really mattered.

"Elijah."

He turned back towards the bed again. His eyes darkened with confusion, and then surprise, as Elena pulled herself upwards onto her knees with an obvious strain, wobbling slightly as she fought to hold that position. His long fingers snagged her hand readily in an attempt to steady her, and she held onto it gratefully before using it to pull herself closer.

"Elena, what are you—"

Soft lips pressed chastely against his, the achingly gentle mouth answering his question. It was an unexpected, transient intimacy that was all too soon denied him as Elena leaned back with slightly flustered eyes and flushed cheeks that reverted quickly to a sickly pallor. Her gaze darted around frantically as she tried to wriggle away, almost searching her room for any possible pathway of escape.

He didn't allow her to go far.

The kiss was returned—equally as soft, equally as innocent—upon her brow. Something was murmured against her cooling skin; worshipful words that were even more ancient than the being who uttered them.

Elena blinked up at him. Brown eyes rounded sweetly with surprise, and then narrowed just as rapidly.

"You liar," she accused.

A small, amused smile tilted his lips. He brushed an errant strand of dark hair obscuring her assessing eyes. "I don't think I've ever received such a response. Admittedly I've only ever said it once, but…"

"You said you'd never let yourself feel that. Not for anyone." Her voice was cautious, lessening marginally from the rampant disbelief a moment before.

"Indeed," he agreed with her wryly. "But once again, Elena, you seem to be proving yourself an exception to the rule."

She was settled back upon her pillows with little fuss, his fingers trailing lingeringly upon alarmingly cooling skin. He denied the temptation to simply lift her into his arms, to greedily spirit her away from fate and sequester her from what was to befall her.

But he didn't.

Instead, he pressed fingertips lightly against her cheek in a caressing mimicry of a kiss, turned his back, and went to retrieve her brother.

—

—

* * *

**Sooo…here's the way I see it. One of two things could happen, couldn't it?**

**Either Elena decided to die and Elijah's gone to fetch Jeremy to comfort her in her final moments. Or…Elena decided to live, Elijah's understandably pained over the idea of her becoming a vampire, and he's gone to fetch Jeremy to be the human blood donor. **

**I'll let my beloved readers decide for themselves what happened. I'm interested to see if there are more pessimistic or hopeful people out there ;)**

**I'm not sure whether anyone ships Elejah anymore or not, but I had this sitting around on my computer and decided to clean it up and post it. I'm going to be honest and admit I don't watch TVD anymore because that show seems to go around in endless circles, and I NEVER started watching the Originals because the storyline didn't interest me and they seemed to be butchering Elijah's character (and he has a romance with HAYLEY? Really?). I'm really more into 'Once Upon a Time' now, so I've been drawing and writing fanfic for the Captain Swan pairing of that and haven't focused on Elejah much. **

**I'm actually in the process of finishing up the last chapter of 'meddlers'. I really want to finish my 'impulse' series as well. I'll post them eventually, if anyone's still interested. I got into grad school, so that's probably going to be the end of my Elejah stories, although I might occasionally be hit with the urge to write something for a couple I really adored once. **


End file.
